


Not a Stray

by JTR01



Category: Doctor Who: Scream of the Shalka
Genre: M/M, One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-11
Updated: 2020-12-11
Packaged: 2021-03-11 00:47:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 849
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28016451
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JTR01/pseuds/JTR01
Summary: The TARDIS doesn't approve of the new relationship between her thief and the Master. Just a short one shot for Scream of the Shalka.
Relationships: Ninth Doctor/The Master (Doctor Who: Scream of the Shalka)
Kudos: 3





	Not a Stray

**Author's Note:**

> This is done for a Doctor Who forum. I don't own Doctor Who.

She had seen her thief take in many strays over the many lives they've experienced since she stole them. He had been a man then and he was a man now, but there had been many faces between them and now. Though no matter how many lives they lived they will always be outnumbered by the legion of faces that belonged to the strays. The strays very rarely varied from the basic sort that attracted her thief, young females who tended to fall for her thief and were in her opinion not really worth remembering. Occasionally a few men were there, such as the pretty one, and a few were worth remembering, like the very first one who helped her thief, but she never really cared for the majority of them. Because of that she never truly hated any of them until he arrived.

He didn't even deserve to be called a stray since they always cared about her thief and he certainly didn't deserve an affectionate name. He was the Master, he was a monster who had hurt so many included her and for some reason her thief was showing him kindness. She knows he is hurting over what happened to the last stray, the princess as she came to call her, and understands that he would need time to recover. But she had figured that he would eventually find another who will make him smile, remind him of what makes the universe so beautiful and it would be back to normal. Instead he saved the Master by transferring his mind into an android body and has made him one of his strays, a fact which clearly annoys the Master as his programming prevents him from doing what he wouldn't undoubtedly love to be doing.

And if choosing the trust the madman in a moment of despair wants bad enough, their new relationship was disturbing on so many levels. She didn't understand organics all that well but she knew her thief was grieving and in pain. She had tried to tell her thief in her own way to stop everything, to deactivate the Master before he figures out a way to escape and kill hundreds for laughs but he won't listen.

She was watching them right now, fiddling away in the room where her thief keeps his little inventions. The Master had brought him tea and was sitting very close to her thief, while finding many excuses to touch him. Saying her thief had some dust on his jacket for example, or asking her thief to hand him something. When it first started happening she had assumed the Master was taking advantage of her thief's grief, while her thief turned to the Master for a distraction from his pain. But as time went on she began to see that it was much worse than that, because she can tell that things were becoming more and more personal for them even if they won't admit it to each other. Which is why she continued to do things to voice her displeasure about the arrangement no matter how many times her thief tells her to stop, ignoring how she was practically screaming at him that this would not end well. Anyone with knowledge of their history would know this, but she knows with absolutely certainly that it will only end with heartbreak.

She knows this because she can perceive all of time and space, as confusing as that is even for her kind, and she knows this relationship won't last. She had this current console room, unique in its design since she created it herself, prepared a hundred faces ago and she has another hundred prepared right now because she knows her thief will need them. She knows that he will find a new stray and that they will leave, only for another to take their place. She knows that no matter what path her thief takes his journey ends the same place her will, with him dying on Trenzalore and she becoming his tomb. The point is that while she doesn't know how everything will happen she knows it will happen just like she knows that, even if the Master genuinely cares for her thief for the moment, their relationship will end.

She knows that one day the Master will go back to how he was because no matter what changes he will never believe anything matters more than himself. Just like her thief, regardless of how different he is, can never stop seeing the beauty in even the worst parts of the universe. He might forget or doubt it, but he would always find a stray to remind him of the truth while the Master never needs to be reminded of what he believes. And so no matter how angry her thief becomes, no matter what the Master threatens to do, she must continue to stop this relationship from progressing. Because she knows that if she doesn't all she will see is her thief falling into despair all over again, a sight which brings her so much pain.

**Author's Note:**

> Tell me what you think and of there are any spelling mistakes or sentences that don't make sense. If you're wondering why I referenced Rory, since he was only referred to as the Ninth Doctor in third person by the novelization I like to think he is actually a far off future incarnation to make him canon. Also the mention of Trenzalore related to an old one shot and my belief that the Doctor's death was only postponed by the events of Time of the Doctor.


End file.
